Prolonged labor lowers productivity, competitiveness
Paul Krugman, a Nobel laureate U.S. economist, visited Korea in 2018 when the country shortened its legal workweek from 68 hours to 52.
"Fifty-two hours a week?" Krugman asked back in surprise at a talk show in Seoul. "It's amazing, thinking Korea is also an industrialized country … that is not good for a balanced life."
What will the pundit say to hear Korea is returning to 69 hours a week?
On Monday, the government announced measures to "reform" the 52-hour workweek system by allowing "more flexibility and choice" in work hours. Under the new system, employers can add 29 hours a week of overtime, instead of the current 12, to the basic 40 hours.
The current system is somewhat rigid, especially for some workers and industries. For instance, employees in IT or entertainment companies should work intensively for a period and have a long rest afterward. A survey by a chaebol lobby group also showed half of workers in their 20s and 30s want to focus their labor on three or four days each week.
"The new system will benefit workers with various working hour options, such as a four-day workweek and a sabbatical month," Labor Minister Lee Jeong-shik said at a press conference. Lee was referring to the new "working hours savings system," in which a worker can save overtime work hours as paid leave days and use them consecutively with paid leave days, extending holidays up to one month.
So far, so good, it seems.
However, as with most other policies, the Yoon Suk Yeol administration's labor reform plan ignores reality completely.
Currently, workers at only four out of 10 companies spend even their annual leave in its entirety. The other 60 percent remain content with weeklong summer vacations. Workers cannot use their legal holidays fully as they feel sorry for their coworkers in perennially understaffed offices. Add to this the low unionization rate of 14 percent in Korea ― the law is one thing, and the reality is another in Korea's labor playground tilted to the advantage of employers.
Even under the 52-hour workweek system, Koreans worked 1,915 hours in 2021, the fifth-longest among 38 OECD members. Considering the top four were Latin American countries that joined the club of rich countries recently, Korea is by far the longest-working country among industrialized nations, working 10 hours a week longer than Germany. From 2019 to 2021, 196 workers committed suicide and were recognized as industrial accidents. Fifty-eight cases, or 36 percent, were due to overwork, meaning they worked 64 hours a week for four weeks.
During his campaign days, President Yoon said workers "should be able to work for 120 hours" a week. But some European countries reportedly seek a four-day, 35-hour workweek. International reports show Korea's labor productivity lags far behind these European nations. The Yoon administration's labor reform is one of its many policies running squarely counter to global trends. So is Yoon's war against unions under the pretext of weeding out labor aristocracy, which represents just a few bad apples in the barrel.
Flexible labor is necessary for the Fourth Industrial Revolution, marked by increasingly diverse workweeks and labor cultures. Still, productivity comes from creativity in the new industrial era, and creativity cannot grow when people must spend long hours at offices.
The government is mandating longer workweeks by law while encouraging more extended vacations through public awareness campaigns. That must go in opposite ways ― it should reinforce shorter workweeks and allow flexibility voluntarily through labor-management talks. Call it a month-long vacation or sabbatical month, but it is impossible without an alternative, a surplus workforce. The new policy will aggravate the already-polarized labor scene between workers at big, wealthy businesses and those at their smaller suppliers.
The liberal opposition parties have one more thing to do at the National Assembly to stop this anachronistic administration.
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